Evoz: Baby Monitoring 2.0 Comes Of Age

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Very soon (as in: in the next few days), I’ll become a father for the first time. And of course, as every existing parent seems to know, babies cost money. One of those unbearable things young parents need to purchase without further ado, is a baby monitoring system.

Me and my wife already bought one, but while we were evaluating existing systems I couldn’t help but notice that even the more advanced ones on the market today seem little more than glorified walkie-talkies.

A couple of weeks ago, knowing that I would soon become a dad, Jyri Engestrom nudged me and said he had stumbled upon a fledgling company, Evoz, that set out to build a baby monitoring system for the always-connected generation, and that I should check it out.

A couple of emails with the startup in question later, yesterday I finally got a live demo from the company’s founder Avishai Shoham. The verdict? It’s freaking amazing.

Imagine if you had an iPhone or iPod touch to spare, and that you’d simply install it in a charger in your young child’s room like you would any baby monitor.

Now imagine that an always-on application installed on the device would let you call in from anywhere in the world to hear how your baby is sleeping (or exactly how hard he or she is crying, or if you’re lucky, laughing or playing). Imagine that you could also opt to receive ‘quiet’ alerts by SMS or email whenever your kid cries for longer than, say, 5 minutes, so you can give the babysitter a quick call to see what’s up after e.g. a meeting or dinner.

Imagine that the app also automatically collects data on the sleeping and crying behavior of your child, and that you could analyze that data to see if he or she matches the behavior of children of the same age. And that you could just as easily get in touch with a network of baby health experts or sleep consultants if you have any questions or concerns.

Evoz lets you do all that, and more. The company isn’t quite ready to launch yet, but intends to roll out its service more broadly in the next few months. Shoham tells me the company will eventually support multiple mobile platforms. Also in the works: a proprietary hardware unit so you don’t necessarily need a spare iOS or Android device to monitor your baby (prototypes are already in the wild, however, and you can see what it looks like in the image above).

Early adopters with young children (aged 18 months or less) that own at least 2 iOS devices (iPod touch, iPhone, iPad) and don’t mind testing out an unpolished product and provide feedback to the team can apply for early access to Evoz Monitors here.

Please note that you’re required to fit the above criteria to get in – only 20 fast responders will be allowed access to the private beta service.

Investors, take note: Evoz is in the midst of raising a first round of funding, Shoham says, which will be led by Dave McClure and 500 Startups.

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CrunchBase

OverviewEvoz is a complete software platform for the smart home, powering the connected home roadmap of well known brands including British Telecom.
Currently, many products in the connected device space only offer basic functionality, such as remotely controlling and monitoring connected devices. The Evoz platform is built from the ground-up for the next generation of connected-device functionality. With …